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Court Rules the "Google" Trademark Isn't Generic

Posted by samzenpus on from the what's-in-a-name dept.

ericgoldman writes Even though "googling" and "Google it" are now common phrases, a federal court ruled that the "Google" trademark is still a valid trademark instead of a generic term (unlike former trademarks such as escalator, aspirin or yo-yo). The court distinguished between consumers using Google as a verb (such as "google it"), which didn't automatically make the term generic, and consumers using Google to describe one player in the market, which 90%+ of consumers still do.

3 of 159 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Don't google it. Bing it! by Archangel+Michael · · Score: 5, Funny

    BING
    IS
    NOT
    GOOGLE

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  2. Re:Lucky them by wisnoskij · · Score: 5, Informative

    That is how the word is used now, and the summery even states that the ruling takes this into account. They know that googleing is a generic word, but Google is not. A search engine is not called a google, only Google is called Google. This does not change just because googleing is a generic term for performing a internet searching.

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  3. Re:Well, if you're going to push... by TWX · · Score: 5, Insightful

    More to the point, when people use, "Google," as a verb, they mean to actually use Google, as opposed to using any brand of facial tissue available when saying, "Kleenex."

    Besides, if Coca-Cola can retain, "Coke," as a trademark when vast portions of the country refer to basic soft carbonated soda drinks of any type as, "coke," then I don't think that those challenging Gogole's trademark have much of a chance.

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